Patrick Wyatt, creator of the Guild Wars series and one of the original developers at Blizzard Entertainment, talks about the birth of the Warcraft franchise. Originally, they sought to license the Warhammer brand for use in the game. They decided against it.

It’s surprising now to think what might have happened had Blizzard not controlled the intellectual property rights for the Warcraft universe — it’s highly unlikely Blizzard would be such a dominant player in the game industry today.

Blizzard has made over 2 billion dollars on the Warcraft franchise from the games alone. That’s not including the card games, conferences, swag, virtual pets, or their upcoming feature film.